Original Amigurumi Crochet Patterns

Keeping Tidy and Knittin’ Mittens

Yes, the miraculous has happened – after over a week of constant use since my tidying spree my studio has remained at least 90% organized, with the odd 10% of chaos being caused by the general creative flurry of a busy life with more yarn and ideas in it than time. As you can see, we’re still pretty ship shape around here!

New Washi tape arrived last week to swell the collection. I now have all these!

Craft hoarder that I am, I do actually use some of my stuff some of the time. This week I put some of the Washis to good use sprucing up a set of folders that had been used by my middle son for storing his A-level coursework in. These folders weren’t the prettiest of things with their big black and white branded labels on the spines, but because I actually went with him to choose them a couple of years ago, they are a rather pleasing collection of rainbow colours (he was overruled on the ‘let’s just go for black ones, it’s easier’ line of thought) so there was definitely some salvage potential there.

I rifled through my collection of coloured papers and found a match for each file then I paired them up with their closest complimentary washi tape partners.Co-ordinated heaven!

After a little bit of measuring, cutting and sticking, the slightly tatty, bog standard A4 lever arch files were transformed into something bright and neat and pretty.Makeover complete and here they all are, harmoniously nestled into their new home.Now if I’m going to be really fussy here, and I am pretty fussy generally, I’d probably say that the pink Washi tape isn’t really a close enough match. Oh well, it’ll do for now. In the meantime, deep pink Washi tape goes onto the shopping list.

I’ve begun to fill the folders already. I’m cataloguing my vast yarn collection to keep a track of which colours I’ve used for each amigurumi design, complete with brand and shade numbers. The idea is to make it much easier to re-stock a particular colour, or at least track down its nearest equivalent when I run out. Sometimes guess work just isn’t good enough. It’s a big job and is still ongoing but so far, so good. A stack of plastic sleeves meant for storing business cards in are the perfect solution for identifying all those yarn shades at a glance.My recent mass yarn sort out has been useful for reminding me of all those glorious oddments and single balls of variegated yarns. They were mostly found buried in the bottom of boxes under mounds of all the solid colours that tend to get much more regular use in my normal line of work, but now they have a box all to themselves.With an urge to put some of this rediscovered kaleidoscopic yarn to good use I focused my attention on making a few pairs of fingerless mitts. I have to say that working crochet in the round with just a single hook is a doddle by comparison, but I do love the look of knitted gloves and socks so much better than crocheted ones and the four needle juggling act is becoming much less clumsy the more I practice.Multicoloured yarn is my new favorite thing. All the pleasure of pretty patterning without the pain of constantly swapping out balls of wool. I even managed to create two pairs of mitts containing every colour of the rainbow with just two balls of yarn.I do enjoy working up these little projects – I can get a single mitt made in the course of an evening – the almost instant gratification is, well… gratifying! I always find myself fascinated by how each yarn orders itself. Some yarn stripes its way along in more or less single rows as with the first pair I made in this lovely mix of blues.The second pair of the week were a little more random in their patterning. Love these tutti frutti colours. A wearable tonic for the dullest of wet winter days. I made these a few rounds shorter to mix things up a bit.I also finished off a dark blue pair of mitts which had been languishing since last spring, thereby removing another project from the work-in-progress pile. Yippee!The patterning on this one reminds me of ripples on the sea.Or even the canal. No wild and untamed sea around here but plenty of gently choppy canals.After two and a bit pairs of plain stocking stitch mitts my brain started craving something a bit more challenging so the final finished pair of the week has a chunky cable detail.They were going to have a pompom flourish but my youngest son has decided he’d really like to be their owner and has vetoed the pompom idea as silly, so I’ll save that for the next pair I make for myself. I’m not at all afraid of a bit of silly!

So with that plan in mind I started another pair today, on a short Sunday car run over to visit my parents. This time they’re in softly striping shades of pinks, lavenders and taupes. Too girly to be appropriated by any of my three boys, or hubby either, so I can be quite confident I won’t get hoodwinked into parting with my latest mitts. I’ll be adding a bit of pompom magic to these instead.I’ve certainly got enough pompoms going spare at the moment.If Minnie ever lets me near them!

I haven’t only been organising my craft stuff and knitting mittens though. I also have a new pattern on the way. So before I go, here’s a sneak peek at my newest Moji-Moji family members.I couldn’t resist adding some pompoms to these either!

What a lively colourful start to a wet and very windy Monday, thank you! I love your mitts. Ever since I started sick knitting I have wanted to transfer the skills to mitts but haven’t mastered the thumb gusset 🙁

I’m used to my teenagers using the term ‘sick’ to mean ‘wicked’ or ‘cool’, so thought you might be wearing a hoodie too! 🙂 But sock knitting makes much more sense!

The thumb gusset on these mitts is very easy, just increasing by two stitches (between markers) every other round. I’ll see about doing a photo tutorial of my simple gloves over the next few weeks. Just getting the circus designs for the new book out of the way first.

It’s always a pleasure reading your articles. I knew I had never seen that little koala in the first pic :p The pompoms ears are such a great idea ! And I absolutely love your wooden keyboard and mouse. And all those colors… It brightened my morning ! Thank you 🙂

An enjoyable read and a lovely start to a horrid dank and miserable Monday morning. I love the mitts and also the amigurumi characters, but I can only knit (I wish I could crochet) and your mittens have given me inspiration to knit more.

I’m envious of your ability to do knitting in the round – even when my hands allowed me to knit, I never really got the hang of that 🙂
I do love your multi-coloured yarns though – I sorted out my stash a few months ago, and ended up with a big box full, and am looking forward to getting an idea and working it with some of it 🙂
I also can’t wait to see your new designs, especially with those cute pompom ears! What a delight! 🙂

It’s so much easier to get inspired when I can see all my yarn colours in one go. The knitting is quite fiddly compared to crocheting, I hate it when I drop a stitch and it ladders. I love crochet for not presenting me with that problem, but the look of a knitted stitch is so delicate and pretty, so I persevere – with some swear words involved! Running through the new design tonight so it should be up soon 🙂

Yay! That means my impatience will be rewarded even quicker than I supposed 🙂

I’m with you on the wonderful delicacy of knitted stitches – and there are so many wonderful designs for practically everything out there for knitting, which drives me mad when I see something i’d love to create, but can’t because it’s knitted 🙁
Mind you, I feel crochet is gradually catching up in the designs stakes, and that’s purely because of dedicated designers such as yourself 🙂